


Ebony

by antsu_in_my_pantsu



Series: Greyscales [2]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: (this is dr what did you expect), Despair, F/F, Guilt, POV Third Person Limited, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Sexual Tension, Sexual Themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-15 21:41:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21025166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antsu_in_my_pantsu/pseuds/antsu_in_my_pantsu
Summary: Kaede could not win, and her dearest admirer Tsumugi could not either.-A tale of infatuation, atonement, lamentation - regicide as an act of Tsumugi's design.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna keep it real with you, beloved reader, this story is very much a conflict of interests between my dick and my desire to be pretentious.  
I wrote the first half in early 2019, abandoned it, and then wrote the latter half in October of 2019. My writing has drastically changed between those two eras, so I apologize for the two discordant halves forming an ultimately dysfunctional whole.  
A list of allusions will be at the end of the work because I make a lot of references to other media (especially the bible sdfnskd).  
Please enjoy ♡  
EDIT: I SOMEHOW FORGOT TO FUCKING MENTION THIS IS A SEQUEL TO MY OTHER FANFIC "IVORY." My two brain cells decided to demolish themselves, huh??? Real dumbass hours

The ebony of Kaede Akamatsu’s pupils held the same depth as the midnight sky, Tsumugi found. 

The stars could also be found in her eyes in the form of sparkling slivers of hope, dazzling fragments of resolve. Her pink iris resembled galaxies that could only be found in the fathomless corner of space and time. They held the same effervescence, the same mousseux quality of a fine champagne, fizzing and blushing. 

Or rather, perhaps her pupils were a rich soil encircled in roseate flowers, lush for those who either wish to preen or dispose of them. 

Together, they had been laying side by side in the grass for nearly an hour. Kaede was stargazing, Tsumugi was gazing at Kaede, a star in the blue girl’s eyes. It felt as though she held all the time of the universe in her pocket, all the hours, minutes, and seconds in the world to admire the features of Kaede’s face. The blonde was too immersed in leering at the expanse of the heavens to notice

“Do you think it’ll be ten o’clock soon?” Kaede mumbled, turning her head in the grass to face Tsumugi. 

As she did this, she closed her eyes gently, inhaling the earthy aroma _ .  _ Her nose scrunched as the redolence flooded her senses, her freckles shifting over porcelain skin. As she exhaled, her eyes went half-lidded and a petite yet doting smile encompassed her face. Small strands of her hair were laced through the grass, blonde and viridescent plantation engaging in intercourse. 

Tsumugi, in that moment, suddenly became very grateful she had begged her superiors at  _ Danganronpa _ to fork over the money for real grass when designing the set. This singular moment made all the trouble and paycheck cuts worth it. 

Tsumugi peered over with her pallid eyes. “Probably.” 

Kaede sat upright, and the moonlight spilling over her previously silhouetted form; she was glowing, lustrous.

“Do you want to spend the night with me?” 

Tsumugi jerked up from her previously sitting lax position, her shoulders tense and face hot. “I didn’t take you to be  _ that  _ kind of girl, like Iruma said -”

“N-Not like that! I just mean for, like, safety. Who knows what could happen to us alone?” Kaede tilted her face downwards, girdling her soft features in a veneer of shadows. 

_ Actually, I know what’s going to happen because I wrote the script, which you are currently breaking _ Tsumugi thought, tentative and moderately panicked.

Was Kaede planning to kill her, strike her dead with a shot instead of Rantaro Amami? Had Tsumugi fucked up this badly? Were her masterful machinations unwoven with such graceful ease? She intended to give Kaede some freewill to keep the game engaging, but this… it was volatile. Mercurial. To put it simply, it could prove to be entirely unsafe and dangerous.

“Of course I’ll stay with you, Akamatsu,”

Thus, they set off for Kaede’s room, swaddled in the silence of night. Tsumugi knew she deserved death, and what better than to die at the hands of her Beloved, her Paraclete?

Neither were sure of where this was to go, yet Tsumugi was certain she sought whatever would happen next, whether it be sexual or mortal. 

Upon entering her room, the blue haired girl elected to awkwardly stand in front of the door, for she was the clear epitome of suave. The blonde threw off her unbearably preppy sweater vest, pink and pristine, and then proceeded to undo her shirt buttons a few. Her fingers slid down her own chest with such elegance; it was stupid that somebody could look so captivating while unbinding fucking buttons, yet the sight drove Tsumugi into an amatory mania. 

She then realized the implications of such an action, and her whole body sweltered. “Akamatsu, I thought y-you said-!” 

“If you’re uncomfortable, then I could take off your blazer, too” Kaede interjects, eyes not meeting the other girl’s. 

Tsumugi spoke naught in response, but there was no need, for a sort of nonverbal, psychic dialogue occurred between the two of them. However, she could be beguiling her own mind into believing this was so. Trust the veracity of no-one, not even yourself. Maybe Kaede did act with virtuous intent; after all, she has a demure nature. 

Kaede pushed Tsumugi’s blazer down her arms, the piece of fabric falling the floor with only a faint sound as indication of its landing. Neither moved to retrieve it. Kaede took a step forward, Tsumugi took a step back, and then the wall was upon her spine, arctic in its acute iciness against the heat of her body, shielded by thin material. Kaede moved to unbutton the other’s shirt, careful to keep her hands raised as to avoid any contact.

After a few buttons were liberated, Kaede left her hands against Tsumugi’s chest, softly kneading them into the flesh just under the shoulders and right above the collarbones. She exhaled tremulously and glanced up with perfervid eyes.

The exchange made Tsumugi’s face redden. She hated when that happened because she knew when she blushed it wasn’t an even or cute spread of color, but it often manifested as vermillion blotches scattered over her face and neck and ears. She wanted to hide in that moment, for the air of the entire intimate dealing has lodged itself in Tsumugi’s windpipe, only allowing her breaths to be expelled in ragged and choked gasps. 

Kaede brushes a piece of hair behind Tsumugi’s ear, her touch ghostly as her digits slid down Tsumugi’s jaw. She tilted the other girl’s chin downward, and maybe Tsumugi dreamed it whilst inundated in her state of reverie, but she would’ve sworn she felt a lean finger scuff her bottom lip. 

_ I can’t feel this way. I can’t feel this way. I can’t feel this way about her of all people, I just can’t feel this way. I can’t.  _

Kaede retracts from the other in a rather taciturn, awkward manner. The action felt unnatural, it’s time was abysmal, and the most chilling fact of all is that it was performed only with the intent to sever anything between them.

Discomfiture permeated the room. _ _

Kaede flopped onto her bed in an authentic way, staring at the ceiling. She kicked off her shoes and laid there, silent and exquisite, for a beat. She was an embodiment of pure saintly divinity, truly an embodiment of Plato’s forms and the trinity to which the human eye cannot do justice. 

“You can join me, Shirogane,” She said to her unadorned, beige ceiling, the only thing in the room that could beat Tsumugi in the inherent dullness of its pathetic existence. 

Tsumugi sat on the bed, diffident, when a spark of self consciousness ignited within her. She because starkly aware of how the way the bed gave way at her weight, as though she was intruding on a space that was meant only for Kaede’s presence. Of course, this self-consciousness couldn’t be made known, for that would only make the whole ordeal weirder, so Tsumugi topples onto her back as well. 

She turned to look at the other girl. Kaede tittered in a breathy sort of way, but she didn’t drop her leer when she met the other’s ghostly eyes. 

They laid. There was only Tsumugi and Kaede, Hell and Heaven, Creator and Creation, and everything in between them, all the humanity that could bestowed into a single man. 

“It’s kind of cold in here isn’t?” Kaede’s sonorous voice speared through the silence as her hands crept over her shoulders. “I dunno, maybe it’s just me.”

“You can lay next to me if you want,” Tsumugi offered, her voice shaking minimally due to the concentration she was placing specifically into making her voice not shaky. Her jaw locked after she finished speaking, teeth clenched, as if to prevent any unwanted words from escaping the confines of her heart. 

There was, of course, the fact Kaede could just crawl under the covers on her bed and be contented. However, she seemed more than acquiscent to curl up next to Tsumugi, one arm strewn over the other’s stomach, her head resting in the area between the shoulder and neck. Tsumugi felt a bit gangly and gawky bending her arm around the blonde’s shoulders, placing her hand on her hip, but Tsumugi convinced herself it was important for Kaede to stay warm. Or something like that.

Kaede exhaled airily, contented _ ,  _ and the breath flooded over Tsumugi’s neck. She ran an experimental hand through the blonde’s hair, pleased when she sharply inhaled as the other girl’s fingertips grazed her scalp. Her meek hand slithered to Kaede’s face, brushing the back of her hand against the curve of the other’s apple-round cheek bone. In a flippant act of temerity, Tsumugi brings her secondhand to Kaede’s neck, but the pads of her fingers barely prodding the tender flesh as though it were made of fragile glass or porcelain. 

_ I want to touch her neck before it breaks,  _ the mastermind thinks.

Kaede slid her hand down a few inches, pressing her palm into that little area of flesh beneath the hipbone. 

_ Fuck, I bet she can hear how fast my heart is beating. What if she’s counting it in beats per minute? Could she use it as a metronome and play a little tune with it? Probably not. It’s probably beating too fast. Maybe she could play the third act of Hungarian Rhapsody number twelve. Fuck, Kaede Akamatsu I’ve never felt so in love in my whole life. I loved you before you even auditioned when we went to school together, and now I still can’t shake the feeling. I just want your warmth next to me, I want to feel you so badly. _

Kaede almost incoherently mumbled, “I- Shirogane, I- fuck.” 

In one graceful motion, she swung her leg over Tsumugi’s thighs, straddling the other girl. With one hand by the side of Tsumugi’s face and the other gently removing her glasses. The light fixture behind Kaede produced a luminescence that blurred into the edges of her face, and she looked angelic. 

“This is okay, Shirogane?” She swallowed, looking away as she shifted her weight to rest on Tsumugi’s hips. 

Something primal emerged from within Tsumugi at that moment, “Only if you call me by my first name.” 

Kaede narrowed her eyes in an perfervid fashion, a contrast to the velvet quality of her carmine lips, round cheek bones, alluring eyelashes, and subtle curvature of her brow. Kaede’s complexion was florid in every meaning of the word. 

“I want you, Tsumugi.” 

“Kaede.” 

Tsumugi chose that name, didn’t she? The nations will put their hope in her name. Why was it so hard to say now?

Tsumugi could barely push the word out before Kaede’s lips were on hers, her hands on her jaw, and Tsumugi felt like every one of her ribs were beaten in by a sledgehammer. This has to be the most delightful compassion she has ever experienced. The way Kaede’s skin gave in under Tsumugi’s hands, the manner in which the blonde’s hair draped over her own shoulders, the classical arch of her spine was so mesmerizing to witness. 

Kaede tasted intoxicating, electrifying, and vaguely of bubblegum. Tsumugi hastily noted it as the most heavenly thing she’s ever had the pleasure of tasting. It imbued the vacuous cavity in her chest with a tingly nectar, as though her blood was a frizzante wine, her innards a bubbling soda. Tsumugi’s skittish fingers run down the other’s neck, the neck that would be splintered in a few short days, digits brushing against her pronounced collarbone.

However, that taste turned piercingly salty, a sharp disturbance in the haze of reverie consuming Tsumugi’s perception. As if on cue, Kaede began to tremble under the other’s touch, juddering as her breath hitched. 

Tsumugi grew worried that she had done something to wrong Kaede, just as her worst fears stipulated she would. Disquieted and confounded, Tsumugi drew away. It was excruciating. The foot of space between them could have been a mile, and Tsumugi wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference.

The pianist leered at Tsumugi. Her visage was coated in a deluge of tears, blank before it crippled inwards. Slowly and mindfully, she brought her hand to her mouth, trying her best to choke as little as possible as she gently wept. 

Kaede’s eyes were exceptionally severe, her pupils contracted, leaving a sea of pink to gaze at Tsumugi with… what? Agony? Ire? Melancholy? It was as though she was trying to strike a confession out of Tsumugi with her rapierlike eyes, perforating the chasmic depths of what’s left of other’s soul.

The blue girl felt her lungs collapse inside of her chest cavity. Her pulse made itself noticeable, drubbing under her skin as though the blood desired liberation from the living corpse it was trapped within. 

“I’m the mastermind.”

Kaede’s expression was unreadable after the three words poured over Tsumugi’s tongue. The ebon centres of her eyes dilate, catlike. Her lips were pursed. She held her hands to her chest - was it an act of self-preservation or establishing distance?

“I’m sorry,” The mastermind continued, the words forcing themselves out between the cracks of teeth. “I know you probably hate me now, and I don’t blame you, but I was so obsessed with the idea of Her. She just - I don’t know - fuck! She became everything to me ‘cause I didn’t have anything else. I didn’t have anything to live for, so why not kill myself in some elaborate game, you know? But I don’t need Her anymore! I don’t want Her. She makes me sick. I only want… I only need…. I… ”

  
Tsumugi was on the verge of avowing “I regret everything,” but the words lodged themselves in her chest and stayed there, dully aching underneath her ribs. Words in sets of three always proved arduous to speak. It was easier to rant, go on a periphrastic tirade to which nobody will listen, where she can remain present and absent, alive and worthless.

Kaede studied the girl with pansy eyes, and an infinitesimal smile cracked over her lips. “You’re kind, Tsumugi, but I know that isn’t true.” 

Immediately, a pang of annoyance resounded throughout Tsumugi’s body. How could one individual be so injudiciously trusting of others? Tsumugi literally handed a confession to her on a silver platter, only for it to be rejected? How could she not see what was quite literally in front of her: a hopeless situation with hopeless people drunk with their inclination to kill? 

It wasn’t hard to convince a human being to kill, especially with some modifications. In colloquial terms, all one had to do was flip a few switches, push a few buttons, and place them in the perfectly stressful situation that would welcome a break. Technology with the ability to rewrite personalities was being used to produce homicidal teenagers - characters, that’s all they are - for the delirious public.

However, that annoyance subsided as soon as it came, leaving Tsumugi with a cold feeling that enveloped her impious bones. It was beautiful, in a pure and innocent way, that Kaede was so sanguine. Tsumugi may have planted the seeds, yet Kaede’s brilliant mind turned her drive towards the truth into something of her own design. Perhaps she was a mediocre rhetorician, yet that meant nothing in the wake of her raw tenacity.

Tsumugi spoke at a tone which she thought was inaudible. “I betrayed you for twenty silver coins, and you still forgive me?”

Kaede gazed wistfully; her eyes perished their initial edge. “Please don’t lie to me, Tsumugi It won’t make me feel better. Not to mention, I hate liars.”

She vomited the word out, a bane on her tongue, yet it was an act of self flagellation, if anything. The serrated glint in her eye indicated as such. Kaede was as teller of untruths herself, scheming her wiles in an attempt to reign victorious of an anonymous and omnipotent foe. To Kaede, perhaps, she’s battling the mastermind, Tsumugi herself, yet that fight proved futile in the face of her amatory affections. Kaede’s quarrel was more so a battle against a philosophy, an emotion, a disease, or a parasite. Intoxicating, alluring, and crushingly dismal, Tsumugi knew this ailment infested Kaede’s soul, festering ugly guilt and the propensity for blasphemy_._ It was a word not to be uttered; one loathed and simultaneously adored. 

Despair.    


Tsumugi saw through her with a type of pervasiveness, under her skin and skull, directly into her mind; she knew of all the sin that dwelled within the righteous and reckless rationality of Kaede Akamatsu. 

Kaede could not win, and her dearest admirer Tsumugi could not either. The protagonist’s inevitable demise would act as a catalyst for corruption of her peers’ souls. To attempt to combat the system was, in and of itself, working for it; an act of self destruction was incredibly convenient for those seeking her ruin. Self-preservation would be an act of mutiny, yet it is far from anything Kaede would spare a thought of. She was too good, yet she was also too naive.

Kaede could not win, and the audience will relish in her failure as Tsumugi wished she could. Her death will be an act of regicide of Tsumugi’s own volition. 

Interjecting the mastermind’s lamentation, Kaede enunciated, “Stay with me?” 


	2. Ending 1 - Rose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tsumugi’s fizzing and buzzing mind was silent for once. In that moment, she felt joy, and that was all there was to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is ending 1!!! I really enjoyed this ending because it's just so *shakes fist* tender... but I'm also a slut for tragedy so That's why we have a second ending!!
> 
> I'm posting this quite late so my writing is not very eloquent right now, forgive me.

Three words. Tsumugi feels trinitarian entities may be growing on her, not unlike moss does a stonewall. 

“Forever,” Tsumugi says. 

Kaede laughs, solace sweeping over her previously troubled expression. Tsumugi thumbs her cheek, tears dampening the pads of her fingers. Kaede takes a hold of her hands and kisses her, chaste and mellow. Tsumugi twines her arms around the other girl, they fall against the bed and kiss, a fruitful communion of two vandalized souls. Kaede’s body was like honey, slow and sure, yet tender and homely. 

Tsumugi didn’t see in ebony and ivory anymore, the greyscale of her life had been discarded and saturated with new hues, a comprehensive gradient of passionate pigments. She had quickly grown partial to pinks, as she saw them in everything: Kaede’s collarbones, Kaede’s lips, Kaede’s cheeks and fingertips and knuckles and ears and eyes and soon it seemed Kaede’s whole body glowed with a brilliant pink aura. 

She saw pink in Kaede. 

Kaede was everything. 

“Tsumugi, can I tell you two things?”

“Of course,” 

Kaede took the other girl’s hands into her own, idly toying with Tsumugi’s fingers. She scrutinized them at length, brushing the pads of her own over the other’s knuckles, her palms.    


“I’m terrified.” Kaede muttered in a muted tone. “I’ve never been so scared in my life. I liked to think the world was inclined towards good, but nobody here truly trusts each other, and I’m doing all I can....”

Kaede’s voice broke and she squeezed her eyes shut. The sight hurt Tsumugi in such a visceral way it galvanized her to stab herself in the palms, grinding tendons and splintering frail bones in hopes of repentance. She didn’t, of course, despite her insatiable desire to.

Tsumugi hummed in response, feeling nauseous. Iniquity hung over her head like a pack of vultures, around her throat like coarse rope. It sat like a rock in her stomach and a tumor in her brain.

“I am as well,” Tsumugi said with such veracity laced in her voice it surprised herself. 

“I have something else to tell you,” Kaede’s face formed a ghost of a smile. 

“Please, enlighten me,”

“I’m in love with you,” 

Tsumugi’s fizzing and buzzing mind was silent for once. In that moment, she felt joy, and that was all there was to it.

“I love you. I adore you. I’m obsessed with you,”    
  
Several other “I” statements spilled out of Tsumugi’s mouth, as she could it impossible to stop once she began. Kaede muttered something about the other was embarrassing her, yet it was uttered with a blush and coy smile. Tsumugi wouldn’t shut up until she felt she had atoned, until her sins were bleached of her blasphemous body. 

She laid beside her breathtaking quietus, contented. Their hands were intertwined, their skin flushed. Kaede, eternally seraphic, gives a piece of her heart to Tsumugi, and in return, Tsumugi allowed that fragment to reside in every action performed, every statement said. The pianist and the mastermind, forever one in the dark of the room and the warmth of the sheets. 

"We’re going to make it out of this,” Tsumugi whispered, interrupting a doting kiss, “We’re going to live forever.”

The following evening, Kaede’s neck snapped on E flat. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As per usual, I'll be putting a list of references and allusions at the end of this chapter :)
> 
> -"Three words. Tsumugi feels trinitarian entities may be growing on her" is a reference to the trinity, since Tsumugi is kind of godless, so I wanted to make it sound like she's not fond of god n all that  
\- “Fruitful communion” word choice of "communion" is referring to both meanings of the word, the christian and secular meanings. I've also heard it used to refer to sex and "becoming one flesh" and all that jazz but those teachings make me kinda uncomfy :')  
\- “it galvanized her to stab herself in the palms” is a clear reference to the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth, in which his palms were allegedly nailed to the cross.  
\- “Quietus” has a double meaning, both of which are true in this context  
\- "Seraphic" obviously refers to Seraphs blah blah blah bible blah blah, but it also sounds like sapphic and THAT'S why I chose to use it over "angelic"  
\- the last line is a reference to the song Kaede dies to, Flea Waltz. E flat is one of the notes played, I believe it is the eleventh or twelfth note? It's essentially just a reference to the song and her execution :')
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Enjoy getting your cheeks clapped in the next one! ♡


	3. Ending 2 - Royal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The room felt empty before she reached the door, yet there was comfort in knowing ghosts would soon occupy it, making it entire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second ending to Ebony! It's a short one, but I hope it is enjoyable nonetheless.

Three words. Tsumugi was beginning to detest trinitarian entities. 

“I bid you farewell,” Tsumugi said. 

“ _ Au revoir _ , Shirogane,” Kaede said, a final act of detachment. 

Tsumugi abraded herself from the room, the girl, and everything that wrought warmth in her life. Her rout was a wordless one. The room felt empty before she reached the door, yet there was comfort in knowing ghosts would soon occupy it, making it entire.

_ I bet she thinks I don’t know what that means.  _

The following twenty-four hours pulled Tsumugi along, a canine in a collar at the heel of a cruel master. Existential conversations of life and death existed exclusively as hushed whispers exchanged between comrades. Trepidation was born from incompetence and ego. Shots were fired, or were they thrown? Tsumugi didn’t know and she couldn’t care; she was a slave to her own creations, carrying out her will with a newfound resentment of self. Irony broke her ribs, guilt broke her spirit, and her heart broke.

Pinks, greens, and blues burnt away in front of her eyes, yet Tsumugi only saw their pigment when she blinked. The world was cast in a grandiose greyscale, except when she slept. Then it was a nauseating kaleidoscope under her thick eyelids from which escape was unfeasible.

She heard yelling. She saw pandemonium. She felt naught.

The following evening, Kaede’s neck snapped on E flat. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this short chapter! This is the second and final ending. Something about tragedy is so alluring to me, so I just had to write one :')
> 
> List of references:   
\- “Three more words. Tsumugi was starting to really dislike trinitarian entities” is reference to trinity, holy spirit and how I think of Tsumugi as a blasphemous individual (as I said in the former chapter).  
\- the title is a reference to the color royal blue! It's really subtle, so I thought I should make my intention clear. I chose "royal" because I like to think of Tsumugi as a malevolent queen, and this is "her" ending in the sense that it focuses on her solitude in absence of Kaede.

**Author's Note:**

> The end is nigh! I have written two separate endings because I feel one was not comprehensive enough (and because I couldn't choose which one I liked more). Here is a list of references of this chapter!  
Allusions:  
\- “blonde and viridescent plantation engaging in intercourse...” This isn't necessarily an allusion, but it's a play on the word "intercourse" and its two meanings ;)  
-“ What better than to die at the hands of her Beloved, her Paraclete...” The holy spirit is often referred to as the Beloved or the lesser known Paraclete in liturgical writings!  
-“Trust the veracity of no-one, not even yourself...” deadass this is just a reference to the trust nobody not even yourself meme  
-“truly an embodiment of Plato’s forms and the trinity to which the human eye cannot do justice” This is an obvious reference to Plato's theory of forms and the transcendental realm.  
-“There was only Tsumugi and Kaede, Hell and Heaven, Creator and Creation, and everything in between them, all the humanity that could bestowed into a single man.” This is an obvious allusion to the bible, but it is also referring to the Creation of Adam painting (cuz the little space between god and Adam's finger is representative of humanity and all that).  
-“Maybe she could play the third act of Hungarian Rhapsody number twelve.” Imma be real I searched "fastest piano songs" and this was one of the first that came up.  
-“The nations will put their hope in her name.” A direct line in which the pronouns are changed from Matthew 12:21  
-“classical arch” refers to renaissance arches in architecture (yes I know that line was awkward as fuck shut uP)  
-“Sanguine” the words means hopeful, especially in a bad situation, but the archaic definition means “blood thirsty” which relates to Kaede's hope due to her protagonist syndrome, but also her willingness to kill Rantaro.  
-"Tsumugi spoke at a tone which she thought was inaudible. 'I betrayed you for twenty silver coins, and you still forgive me?'" OBVIOUS reference to Judas, who sold Jesus to the Pharisees for 20 silver coins.  
-"yet it was an act of self-flagellation, if anything.” This refers to medieval flagellation! I don't have any sources because I learned about this in a history lecture (sorry :( ), but people basically walked through the streets and whipped themselves on the back as an act of repenting. They thought that, in inflicting pain, god would see their rejection of licentious sin and forgive them. 
> 
> That's all for this chapter's notes!! Please read the endings, and leave a comment yelling at me if you liked or hated them :O
> 
> Other social medias:  
Instagram - @wormweeb  
Tumblr - @antsu-in-my-pantsu (shitposting), @wormweeb (fandom)


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